18.9.17

India Offers to Buy $1billion Pulse Beans from Nigeria

India has approached Nigeria to supply it with $1billion (about N367 billion) worth of Pulse Beans.
The Director, Agricultural Business, Processing and Marketing,
Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Azeez Olumuyiwa, made
this revelation at a sensitisation workshop on agriculture held for
officers of the Nigerian Air Force (NAF).
He said that the offer was tabled by the Indian Ambassador to
Nigeria, Nagabushana Reddy, at a parley with Minister of Agriculture and
Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh.
“The Indian ambassador said Pulse Beans is a food variety consumed
four to five times daily by Indians. He has offered to buy $1billion
worth of the products from Nigeria if we can produce it,” Azeez said.
According to him, India, the world’s second most populous nation,
required 27 million metric tonnes of pulse beans. Nigeria’s current
production capacity for the produce is about 47 million metric tonnes.
Pulse Beans is a good source of iron and is mainly grown in Bauchi, Bornu States as well as in Shaki, Oyo State.
The federal government has also admitted unease at China’s plan to begin to use bio-ethanol gasoline across the country by 2020.
The use of bio-fuel, seen as an alternative to fossil energy, is
discomfiting for Nigeria as China is one of the major buyers of her
crude oil.
Rather than continue to import fuel, China wants to focus on
bio-ethanol gasoline production which is a derivative sourced from
sugarcane and corn.
Ogbeh, who revealed government’s mood on the development, also
stressed that two months ago, the United Kingdom, France, Germany,
India, Norway and the Netherlands have indicated plans to ban fuel-run
cars in about two decades, to reduce air pollution and save fossil fuel
energy.
“It is not a particularly soothing news for us because with this
development, there will be less demand for oil and gas. By 2030, all
these countries will be using electric cars. The only way to prepare us
from the revenue that will no longer be available from oil is by
focusing on agriculture,” Ogbeh said in a speech read by his Special
Assistant, Winifred Ochinyabo.
The minister said that only 44 per cent of Nigeria’s 79 million
hectare of arable land was currently utilised, while the country
requires six million metric tonnes of rice per annual to feed its large
population.
The agricultural workshop was held for the NAF officers to encourage them to embrace farming after retirement.
The programme covered orientation on distribution of inputs
materials, warehousing, processing of food, livestock farming, bio-fuel
production and running of agric extension work. The Chief of Air Staff,
Air Marshall Sadique Abubakar, was represented at the workshop by NAF
Chief of Administration, AVM Lawal Alao.